![]() ![]() ![]() This essay places Ryūkō's work in context, characterizing it as a synthesis of a number of elements from the contemporary criticism-the principal among these being the current of negative criticism of Japanese poetry, on the one hand, and the current of positive response to Western free-verse poetry, on the other. It is common for historians of modern Japanese poetry to say that the poet Kawaji Ryūkō was the first to publish free-verse poetry in Japanese (in 1907). In this essay I argue that the appearance of modern Japanese free-verse poetry can be explained using a modified version of Lotman's model. Lotman posits another alternative: the semiotic system might instead choose to break or alter its own rules, renovating and transforming itself by incorporating elements from other semiotic systems. The semiotic system is described as having become rigidified, under such circumstances. In his essays on the dynamics of cultural change, the semiotician Yuri Lotman proposes a model to explain the fact that when an area of culture- poetry, for example-develops a set of self-descriptions-such as poetry criticism, histories of poetry, and so on-that area of culture (or semiotic system, to use Lotman's term) is in a position to become rigidly self-repeating: once it draws up rules for itself, then there is the possibility that it will follow those rules. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |